Opposition to government involvement in education in the United States

Opposition to public education in the United States comes from a variety of sources and is based on many different rationales. The Alliance for Separation of School & State argues that public schools "discourages individuality, innovation, curiosity, creativity and overall excellence." R. Cort Kirkwood of the American Family Association argues that public schools seek to "hammer the child with values approved by the state" and that using public funds for education is inherently problematic because "everyone cannot agree on what should be taught or what "values," to use the vulgate, should be imparted." On March 28, 2002, Focus on the Family founder James C. Dobson stated on his daily radio broadcast: "In the state of California, if I had a child there, I wouldn't put the youngster in a public school...I think it's time to get our kids out. And I'm going to get hit for [saying] that." An article published by the International Society for Individual Liberty states, "Government schools continue to graduate functional illiterates, and US public school students' math skills are now among the worst in the industrialized world." John Taylor Gatto argues that mere reform is not possible, as "School has become too vital a jobs project, contract giver, and protector of the social order to allow itself to be reformed." In The Disestablishment of Schools, Ivan Illich writes, "The first article of a bill of rights for a modern, humanist society would correspond to the First Amendment to the US Constitution: "The State shall make no law with respect to the establishment of education." In Common Fallacies About Capitalism, Nathaniel Branden notes that although everyone is theoretically allowed to send their children to private schools, "most parents are effectively compelled to send their children to State schools, since they are taxed to support these schools and cannot afford to pay the additional fees required to send their children to private schools."

Arguments against public education

Opposition on capitalistic grounds

Jacob G. Hornberger and other libertarians oppose public education on the grounds that it is a welfare program.

History

According to Eugene White, "Some say the first formal blow against public education occurred in 1983 with Secretary of Education Terrel Bell's issuance of 'A Nation at Risk.'" In 1994, the Alliance for the Separation of School and State was founded. Shortly before his death, Marlin Maddoux wrote Public Education Against America: The Hidden Agenda, which argues that Christians should not educate their children in today's public schools. In 2004, a resolution was proposed at the Southern Baptist Convention to encourage "all officers and members of the Southern Baptist Convention and the churches associated with it to remove their children from the government schools and see to it that they receive a thoroughly Christian education, for the glory of God, the good of Christ's church, and the strength of their own commitment to Jesus". The resolution was defeated. On February 12, 2007, Utah Governor Jon Huntsman signed into law a bill that will give up to $3,000 for any public-school student whose parents wish to send the boy or girl to a Christian madrassa.